Commentary

What's Old Isn't Yet New On Retail Sites

In the days first afternoon panel exploring Web site optimization, one of the initial topics was how optimization plays out in the retail space. David Brussin, founder and CEO of Web testing firm Monetate Inc, emphasized that while e-commerce is relatively new, retail has been around for ages. As such, e-commerce systems haven't yet developed to the point where they can replicate the flexibility of brick and mortar stores. It's harder to make changes on the fly the way a company might change around endcaps in a physical store depending on what's selling, he said.

As an example, he pointed to Wal-Mart which developed the retail system 20 years ago to figure out exactly what consumers are doing in its stores. But it hasn't been able to duplicate that system with its online presence. "E-commerce is new but the old stuff hasn't made the leap," he said. "For us, focusing on building a core competency platform around understanding catalogs, product categories, and CRM interactions that any visitor has with a retail site is key because it recognizes the history and legacy of that business."

1 comment about "What's Old Isn't Yet New On Retail Sites".
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  1. Stephen Cobb from Monetate, March 25, 2011 at 11:49 a.m.

    Mark -- Nice report. You definitely hit on a key point that David made, the fact that many legacy enterprises have yet to achieve the level of flexibility and sophistication in marketing and merchandising online that they developed offline some time ago.

    And while many enterprises have developed extensive online analytics too few have put in place the necessary technology to act on that data in a timely fashion.

    Stephen

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